


Penumbra

by AceQueenKing



Category: Ancient Greek Religion & Lore
Genre: Cross-Generational Family Relationships, Effects of Living in the Underworld, F/M, Gen, Grandparents & Grandchildren, complicated family relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-13
Updated: 2019-09-13
Packaged: 2020-10-12 08:04:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20560991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceQueenKing/pseuds/AceQueenKing
Summary: Hades’ tight curls hid most of the toddler’s face, but Demeter caught a glimpse of deep brown eyes –his– and an aquiline nose –his– and lips as red as crimson – even that,his.





	Penumbra

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Missy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Missy/gifts).

When Demeter heard the crunch of sandals upon the dried strands of the dead grass on her lawn, she got up quickly, brushing the clippings she’d taken away from her knees. She wasn’t in any hurry to greet anyone; not in the offseason. “If this is about the seasons again…” she said, suspecting it was her daughter’s father, trying yet again to seek a way to stop her fury. She hadn’t forgiven him for the insult of selling her daughter, to even _think_ that she’d forgive him for the extra time he’d allotted Hades three years past… She looked up, her eyes narrowed and spoiling for a fight, then promptly dropped her sheers in surprise.

“Hello mother.”

_Persephone!_ Demeter sucked in a hot breath. Persephone was standing right here, right at her doorstep, and didn't that just shut her right up. Demeter whipped around, sharp and quick, mouth open. Not much could take Demeter by surprise – but her daughter, it seemed, had a real talent for it.

Persephone stood in front of her, in the flesh and…_here!_ And not only her: her granddaughter, so long mysteriously withheld, lay within her arms. Demeter made a short cry and reached out and grabbed her daughter in a fierce hug; she was real. She was _here._

“Persephone!” She cried out. There was a soft baby grumble under her shoulder; she stepped back in surprise, and took in the sight of her granddaughter for the first time.

The moment Demeter saw the child, she knew why Persephone had elected not to bring her child to her mother’s arms. She looked – “It’s you,” she breathed. 

“It’s me,” her daughter said, bowing slightly. The swallow at her daughter’s throat told her that nothing in this visit would be simple either. She’d nearly broken Demeter's heart two summers past, letting the little newborn be fawned at all over Olympus, all over the Underworld, everywhere but for her very own grandmother’s arms. She had let Hera hold the babe, _Hera_, while she and her daughter had brought the fields to blossom; Persephone had even let her loathsome father’s beard tickle their grandchild’s cheek before allowing Demeter so much as a brief cuddle. Persephone had avoided the topic of the child, shutting her down whenever she had so much as asked the name of the babe. Even when she’d brought the babe to Demeter’s sun-bright temple, she’d kept the babe’s face covered with a blanket.

The second year, she hadn’t bothered to bring the babe at all; her little girl remained with her snake of a father.

Now, after so long being cruelly starved of the sight of the child, Demeter finally understood. She stared down at her granddaughter and knew, exactly, what had happened. Persephone had not done it out of spite for her husband’s burnished pride, or fear that Demeter would be a poor grandmother, or for the sake of political maneuvering, or any other fear that Demeter had held tight in her long-held fist.

She’d avoided showing her child to Demeter because it looked just like _him. _

_“_Mother?” Persephone said again, and Demeter shook her head, aware suddenly that she was staring.

“Hello,” she said, but the sound was flat, even to her own voice; her whole being was preoccupied, studying the babe in its mother’s arms.

The little child was wiggling, uncomfortable as Persephone bounced her back and forth. Hades’ tight curls hid most of the toddler’s face, but she caught a glimpse of deep brown eyes – _his_ – and an aquiline nose – _his_ – and lips as red as crimson – even that, _his_. Her granddaughter peaked out at her grandmother in curiosity and Demeter’s frown deepened. Its coloring was his, too; even the eyebrows, bushy things for such a small baby. “Oh dear,” she said. “Not much of you in this one, is there?”

There was little denying it. She’d raised her granddaughter's father from mere seconds after he was born; Hades had all but grown up in her arms and now she felt like she was staring at his duplicate.

“Mama,” the little babe whimpered, snuggling deeper into her mother’s shoulder. “Mama, mama, mama.”

“Shh,” her daughter said; her hand brushed those tight curls away from a chubby cheek with a well-practiced gesture. “Its okay, baby.”

“Hurts, mama,” the little thing whined; like its father in that, too, eternally unsatisfied. Persephone pressed another kiss to her child’s cheek and it seemed unappeased.

“Close your eyes, baby. Like we practiced.” She stood up a little straighter, tucked the whimpering toddler deeper into her himation, letting her snuffle under the folds of her mother’s cloak. “Can we come inside?”

Demeter nodded, feeling a warmth spread across her cheeks. Persephone shouldn’t have had to ask. Never would have, back in the old days. Ever since she’d _married_ that _man_, there had been a rift slowly growing between her daughter and herself. It hurt Demeter greatly. Demeter never blamed Persephone for her daughter’s marriage; she was still achingly aware her daughter hadn’t had much of the choice in the matter. Zeus had sold their girl like a particularly fine-boned calf and she held him responsible for the vast majority of the blame; it was only the latest in so many disappointments the man had given Demeter. Hades, too, had his part; he had skulked up from the shadows to lay his claim, and she would forever hate him for picking Persephone over one of Hera’s brood, over daring to take her daughter and treat Demeter’s permission as little more than an afterthought.

But still, despite her best efforts, the damage between them had been done. The girl opted to try to make the most of her marriage, and thus Hades had not just ripped his wife away from her childhood home – he had ripped her away from her mother, too. It did not matter that he had not asked Demeter; it did not matter if he was seven times her age if he was as old as a day. Zeus had waved it all away, for want of three seeds, and her daughter…her daughter had indeed married the oaf, _loved _the oaf.

And now she was eternally beholden to him, his child waving in her arms.

Demeter shut the door as Persephone entered, and her daughter wasted no time, quickly stalking through the humble chamber and pulling the curtains shut with a loud flourish. Demeter frowned. Her daughter was seemingly content in the dimness as she never had been before her contemptible marriage, Persephone gently set the little one down, who toddled around her mother on unsure legs.

“Mama,” she said. “Who that? Who that?”

“Who _is_ that?” Demeter said, then winced at the strictness in her voice; at the same moment, Persephone knelt down, keeping her eyes on the child as she gently turned the child to face her grandmother.

“I’m sorry,” Demeter said, ignoring cracking knees – didn’t seem fair, to be a goddess and to suffer _cracking knees_ – and knelt as close to face level for the child as she could bear. “Been a long time since I’ve been around one so young.”

“Who?” The child whined; Demeter reached one hand out toward her.

“I’m…” She tried to find the words for it, but they dried in her throat. Leave it to Hades to render a most natural relationship almost unthinkably difficult.

“That’s your grandma Demeter,” Persephone said, softly filling in her mother’s blank spaces. “Remember when mama told you about her mama? That’s her, that’s your gran.”

The little one looked up at its mother, and Demeter scooted a bit closer. “It’s nice to meet you…” Demeter said, awkwardly formal. She trailed off as she realized she still didn’t know her grandchild’s name; a full fall apple felt wedged up under her throat.

“Tell her your name,” her daughter crooned, a little nervousness obvious in the tightness of her own voice. “Remember? Like we practiced. _My name is_…”

“Muh namis Meli!” the child said; Persephone held out her child’s little hand and Demeter took it, wincing at the surprising chill of it.

“Melinoe,” Persephone said. Demeter bit back a scoff; he’d had his way with that too, obviously. The name was nothing the mother would pick. _Awful_. “We – well, we call her Meli.” Unspoken, but obvious in the way she shrugged, was the invitation for Demeter to use the nickname, too. Meli was cute — and honey a damn better namesake than fruit-of-the-tree, that was for certain. Leave it to her brother to be almost disgustingly literal in his naming.

“Nice to meet you, Meli.” She swallowed, the black tar taste of discomfort utterly disgusting in her throat yet refusing to abate even slightly. She tried to rise above it, shaking the little girl’s hand. Unfortunate to resemble her father so; she’d never be a great beauty. Not like her mother.

“Nice,” the kid said, then smiled, and there, Demeter’s heart softened. The lips were the father’s, but the smile was her mother’s. She took an unsteady step outside her mother’s arms, then another. One more, and she was standing next to her grandmother, arms raised. “Up?”

A one-word request and yet it felt like the world.

“Can I…?” She asked; Persephone nodded.

“Of course,” she said, as if it was obvious. “Just – gentle.”

“I know how to hold a babe,” she snapped, then regretted it; she pulled the little girl into her arms, felt the scratch of Hades’ coarse hair against her cheek.

“Grammie,” her little granddaughter sighed, a hot gust of breath against her shoulder. “Grammie.”

“Yes, Meli.” Persephone smiled at them both and for a moment, the tension slipped. Things felt simpler. She stroked the little thing’s cheek and reminded herself, as much as she could, that the babe was not responsible for her father’s sins.

“Grammie soft,” the little one said, her hands gently exploring Demeter’s throat, her chin. 

“She is,” Persephone said, while Demeter scoffed. Her daughter rose and Demeter did too, carefully holding her precious cargo. “Puts on a hard front sometimes, though.” Her daughter winked, and Demeter rolled her eyes.

“There’s tea in the cabinets, if you’re of a mind to have some. My hands are full, so you’ll have to make it yourself,” she said; Persephone nodded in acquiescence, and began the practice of gently making the tea. Would taste damn near ambrosial, she thought, an autumn tea shared between three generations of goddesses.

Demeter studied the little girl carefully as her mother puttered around the dark kitchen of Demeter’s living-space.

Demeter tilted the little girl's face toward her. The girl grinned up, a full set of teeth shown off in her gummy smile. Demeter’s heart panged at how much she had missed. Her smile faded as she noticed the wide gap between the two front teeth: that was her father’s, too, though she doubted that anyone had seen Hades’ grin-gap since he was about this age.

They had both grown up too fast for that; perhaps if they were both very good, this one might be able to take her time to blossom. Would this child become so grim, too? She wondered. The only thing it seemed she could do was to try to give her granddaughter some example that one did not have to live in perennial darkness.

“Meli,” she sing-songed. “My little Meli.” She put her hand on her belly and tickled more; the child bent with sweet giggling; in that, she was reminded of her own daughter, whose laughter had pulled her through so many difficult early years. Demeter watched that same daughter from the corner of her eye as she stood at the stove; not much laughter to her now. He had taken that joy from her, made her a far more serious person.

“Why did you come here, daughter?” She asked, switching from tickling to bouncing, much to the child’s delight. She tried to ignore the feeling that something was not quite right in her gut as Persephone moved around the kitchen, an age of familiarity giving her a delightful grace as she successfully brought a flame to the old and often persnickety stove. She could perhaps hope that her daughter had left the old coot, younger than Demeter herself but somehow always older, always so prim and _proper. _

Minus his wedding, of course; Hades had broken almost every rule for that.

“We’ll talk about it after she’s tired herself out,” she said, a knife’s edge to her voice. She hadn’t brought bags; Demeter wondered if that meant her suspicions were true, if her lack of baggage had been a ruse, a way to keep her son-in-law had been unaware of Persephone’s escape. If she wanted to come home, she was more than welcome. Demeter could make room here, for her daughter and Meli both. “Meli will need a nap soon enough.”

“No!” Meli hissed, suddenly knocking her grandmother’s hands away. “No no no! No nap!” She wormed out of Demeter’s arms surprisingly furiously, a bit of her father’s fury in her. “Noooo!” She ran toward her mother, tugging on her skirts. “No nap! Nooooo!”

Persephone shook her head. “Stop, baby.”

“Noooooooo!” The child brought herself down with a fury, crashing her fists against the ground. She unleashed a scream, and it was as if the world itself shuddered.

“Meli!” Demeter said, a bit of sharpness to her tone; both daughter and granddaughter turned to her. “I think some kind baker left me a bit of honeycake in offering yesterday; perhaps you’d like a taste?”

“Yes yes!” Distracted instantly, the child moved. “Wanna!”

Her eyes flickered to Persephone, who nodded; she held out her hand, and waited for the little goddess to take it. It felt odd, to walk with a child again, and a child who was not her own, and a child who was her _daughter’s_ own, somehow, and odder still, a child that was _his own_, too, but she did not hesitate to take the girl’s hand. She walked slowly down the hallway. The girl was a clumsy walker still — not a surprise, Hades had probably been neglecting to give her the wide-open spaces a child needed to become fleet of foot — and she kept herself in Demeter’s shadow as much as possible.

“I hope you’ll be coming to visit me more often, Meli,” she said, her feet awkwardly filling in the silence as she walked: click, click, click as her sandals hit the floor. The child, her feet bare, was louder – _thump thump thump thump_ — but then, when one was the princess of the underworld, she supposed there were not many natural predators to hide from.

The child didn’t respond, simply concentrating on following Demeter with rapidly blinking, owlish eyes; when she got to the point where Demeter could open the temple’s doors — a small temple, hers, never one for fancy alters, that was one thing she agreed with Hades on — she grinned happily as her granddaughter took in the sight of her worship.

For one born and raised thus far in the underworld, she knew it would be quite the beautiful image: natural light drifted down from the tip of the ceiling. She’d ordered her worshipers to build an open temple. Plants drifted over her columns, moss over almost everything in fact, more plants than the little one would have probably ever seen deep down in her underworld home. The small pile of presents from worshipers, payment for the calm weather and clean crops in the summertime, was situated near her statue. She knelt down, fished out the slice of honey-cake, still wrapped in a sun-shine bright yellow cloth. Demeter looked down, mouth half-open to ask if her granddaughter would like the cloth, and then shut it abruptly: the child was not there.

She looked up, eyes scanning, fearful. She had not hear the child’s steps stop. “Meli?”

There was no answer. Demeter scanned the room — finally, she saw her; the girl was blinking heavily in the doorway, her arms over her eyes. She hadn’t taken a single step into the open temple.

“Meli,” she called; “Meli. Come here?”

“Nooooo.” She shrunk back into the hall, fast, too fast, fast like only a child could be and Demeter had forgotten the speed required of motherhood. She rose quickly, held the wrapped cake tightly, and ran after her.

“Meli!” She shouted out, urgentness tasting bitter to the tongue. She did not want to lose her only granddaughter here, even if the child was _his_. The hall had gone strangely dark, all the sunlight blotted out; her stomach twisted — had the father realized they are gone? Was he here, hunting them in the shadows, where he had an advantage?

“Meli,” she whispered again, the name as urgent a prayer as her daughter’s name had once been a few years past in the longest and darkest of winters.

“Grammie,” a welcome, gummy voice said, and Demeter rejoiced, seized upon it — the child was not so far gone if she was talking to her, and certainly was not in her vengeful father’s arms; Hades would not permit Demeter such relief. She listened in the darkness, as she had not had to do in many years, not since she herself was a child — the slap of the child’s toddling feet grew closer. Demeter bent down, eager to have her back in her arms.

“Made good,” the little one said oddly, and in the darkness, she caught the glint of a grin in the mostly-dark. Was this her power, this darkness? Demeter suppressed a shudder and stroked at the girl’s curly ringlets. She was alright. They both were. Just a momentary scare, that was all. “Cake?”

“Yes, cake,” she promised, weary; she was careful to put a smile on her face, not wanting her daughter to know anything felt wrong.

The little one gently pressed her hands into her grandmother’s face, and Demeter shifted with a start, surprised; even in the low light of her hall, with every bit of sunlight pushed out, she could still make out that the girl’s face was fascinated, mapping her grandmother’s features with her fingers. “Grammie,” she said, and her poor heart twisted for the little one. Was she so deprived of touch and sight, down in the land of shades? Demeter held her small head and kissed it sweetly.

“You are always welcome in my temple, Meli. And my home, too.” The girl only gummed contentedly on her shoulder in response.

When she entered the dim kitchen, two stone mugs waited on the table. Demeter caught her daughter’s smile as her granddaughter gently tugged and pulled on her face, playing with wrinkles and creating new ones.

“She likes you, I think,” Persephone said, voice quivering, and Demeter understood all that was hidden in that: _I was afraid she wouldn’t_ and _I didn’t think you’d accept her_, and an indignant fire blazed through her before she could stop it.

“Course she does,” she snapped, pride filling in all the blank spaces her insecurities had left behind. “Always been good with kids. You shouldn’t wait so long before bringing the next one.”

“Mmm.” Persephone nodded into her tea, while the little one raised her arms out toward the mother; Demeter felt a strange half-sadness as Persephone scooped her up, gently tucking her back in her arms. “I won’t. I…just wasn’t sure if we’d be welcome.”

“You’re always welcome,” Demeter snorted. “Don’t know how I could have made that clearer.” That was more bluster than truth — Demeter could have made it clearer, perhaps. She’d wasted no end of breath screaming at her daughter’s old husband, and she could see now how Persephone could have taken that poorly. Persephone had decided to _love_ that man, and Demeter, unknowing, had lashed out, had called him every name in the book. She hadn’t meant to bury _him_ so much as defend _her, _but love made everything complicated. Zeus’ judgment had cost her her relationship with her daughter, had cost her the first two years of Melinoe's life. Ridiculous that the girl thought her unworthy of knowing this babe. Meli might be her father’s child but — wasn’t her fault, any more than it was Demeter’s fault for her own father’s tendencies.

“Thank you, mama,” Persephone said after a long moment; Demeter broke the cake rather than answer, filling the silence by dividing the cake into three portions: Persephone’s, Meli’s, and her own. She picked at hers a moment – a bit too dry, for her tastes, and honey-sweet, and Persephone, too, seemed to barely have an appetite. Meli ate hers in loud, smacking chews, and Demeter smiled in the familiarity of that.

“I’m glad I…came to you,” Persephone said, and Demeter snorted; she was glad too but couldn’t quite admit it.

“It’s good to see you,” she finally said, neutrally as she could. “Both of you.”

“See daddy soon?” Meli asked, and Demeter’s brow furrowed as Persephone winced. Something was wrong, she was sure of it.

“Soon baby,” she said, and Meli nodded; she continued to pick at her cake, and they talked about less dangerous subjects. She watched Meli eat: sloppily, as all children did, slowly stuffing her face with tiny fists. She caught a mother’s fondness cross her daughter’s face. Persephone brushed at the girl’s cheek, wiping off the crumbs, and the look of love on her face made Demeter’s chest squeeze, hurt by the thought of how much of this she’d already missed. It hurt, even when she was trying her best not to let it do so.

They talked for hours, mostly of little things, safer things, but every topic made things feel a little easier between them; it was as if they were dismantling a brick wall, slowly starting at the top and chipping their way downwards. The wall didn’t entirely break, but it felt easier to climb, little by little.

But it wasn’t very long at all before Meli began to yawn, first trying to hide it in little pudgy fists and then outright drooping her little head.

“Is it alright if Meli sleeps here tonight?” Persephone asked, and Demeter nodded, her heart pounding at the thought that perhaps she had been right after all, that her girl was leaving Hades. Why would she have the girl sleep at her mother’s house otherwise? She stood and looked down at her daughter, whose face held only neutral grace.

“Course,” she said, bowing. “You too, if you’re tired.” She extended the olive branch and held her breath.

Persephone shook her head. “I’ve got miles to go, tonight.”

Persephone slowly picked Meli up, who offered only the most token of squirming yawns. Persephone gently walked back to the room Demeter and her daughter had shared since Persephone – well, since Persephone had been born. Meli didn’t complain as her mother tucked her little body into her mother’s old bed, the sheets still the ones that Persephone had left not three months ago.

“She’s a deep sleeper, thankfully,” Persephone said, huffing softly. “When she’s out – she’s out.”

“Gets that from her father,” Demeter said without thinking, then winced. She’d been doing good at selectively avoiding the topic of _him_. Persephone just smiled and chuckled.

“Yes,” she said. “But less snoring. Thankfully.”

It was the least controversial way they’d ever discussed that man, and Demeter was content to leave it there. Persephone stroked Meli’s cheek and turned toward her mother, suddenly serious.

“Momma,” she said. “I have to ask you something. Something important.”

“Oh?” This was it. She reached out a hand and her daughter took it, guiding her toward the bed. They sat together.

“I want you to look after Meli.” Persephone swallowed. “Hopefully just for a day. But it could be longer. I don’t know, for sure.”

It was not what Demeter expected. Still, the reply came, automatic.

“Of course.” She squeezed her hands. “You and that little girl have always got a home here, Persephone. Know that.”

Her daughter smiled, squeezed her hands, and said nothing. It was something she’d gotten from that horrible man; some sort of quietness had descended on her daughter’s soul. She’d been a loquacious child, once.

“Spit it out, girl,” she finally said, hoping to jar her daughter into talking. “I’m going to die of old age waiting for you to talk at this rate.” That she was immortal seemed immaterial.

“Its…” Persephone shook her head, sighed. “It's easiest if I just say it plain. A few weeks ago, we had a troublesome guest. His name was – is – Sisyphus.” Demeter was well aware that _guest_ was an odd word for what their charges were, but was more bothered by the switch verb tense. 

“Did that shade try to _touch_ you? Or the _girl_?” She couldn’t imagine Hades letting such an insult to him stand, but then he’d always been such a prim and proper man in every other respect, and she knew, just as every other female knew, that rules tended to favor the menfolk over the womenfolk.

“Nothing like that. Hades would bring him back to life a hundred times just to kill him again and again if he tried to. Whatever you think of it him,” and there was a hardness to her voice there, as if the man hadn’t kidnapped her at the first sign of her blossoming. “He _loves_ us, mama.” Demeter nodded and bit back the scoff she wanted to unleash. L_ove_ was the least that he owed Persephone and his own daughter. He should be thanking his lucky stars her girl was willing to stay with him. “What happened was, that Sisyphus pulled an ugly trick, on us both.”

“Hades? Tricked?” She thought of the last time she’d seen Hades. It had been outside Eleusis, and he had felt clever then, so obviously so: he was all sparkling eyes and wide smiles as they came to “renegotiate” Persephone’s time. He’d droned on for some time, but all she could hear was his casual slander of his daughter at their first meeting: _She ate the seeds Demeter, she knew what that meant and so do you. A goddess born of earth is bound to earth; she could not be misled_. _She chose._ He hadn’t won, fully, all those years ago, but he hadn’t lost, fully, either; months of her daughter’s time, first three and then, at the second meeting at Eleusis, successfully petitioned to six. Realm needed a queen. _My realm needs, my realm, my realm_, he’d argued, citing obscure rules and precedents that hadn’t been applied since their father’s age. Demeter had countered with a promise that the humans would suffer in response; he hadn’t so much as rolled his eyes, just stared. She supposed to Hades such did not matter. They all came to him, eventually.

Persephone’s contemptible father had looked at her with stormy, _weak_ blue eyes and shrugged. Those eyes said _what do you want me to do? _That shrug said _I am tired of all three of you._ She had kept her eyes only upon her daughter, who sat, eyes down, face divinely neutral as her fate was awkwardly argued over. Her hand was on her belly then; only now did she realize why Hades had been so insistent on having six months.

He had not wanted to miss the birth of their child.

“I suppose the mortals will have to suffer longer, then,” Zeus had said. And Hades had taken her back down, just like that; no tears on her daughter’s face, but no smile either. 

There were no tears now. She was strong, her girl. A Queen, whether or not that was the fate that Demeter had wanted for her.

“He had this whole legal case prepared – no one does that, but you know how Hades is. He’d never been petitioned logically by a mortal; the argument was sound... And even I was outraged on his behalf. His wife had not buried him proper, had only given him the coin. He wanted only a few hours as a ghost to demand her to bury him proper and we said we would allow this. But…” She frowned. “He did not return. We sent Thanatos to find him but…”

“Thanatos has not returned,” Demeter guessed, and the small nod of her daughter’s head told her that she had guessed correctly. “And neither has your…” She waved her hand. “Your guest,” she said, failing to find a better word.

“Yes. It has been three weeks. Whatever that cagey man has done, Thanatos hasn’t…” She swallowed, nervous, but hiding it as a Queen would. “Whatever he has done, he has found a way to stopper death.” Her daughter reminded her of her heaven-bound sister, Demeter realized with a start: she had become a capable queen, and Demeter had seen so little of her daughter she hadn’t realized just how much she’d fallen into her half-year role. Her mouth pursed into a thin little line, and she looked up at Demeter with nothing less than divine vengeance in her eyes. “We can’t let it stand.”

Did she intend to go, to free Thanatos? To fight a man who had put death in a bottle? Her belly burned with an anxious, sudden fire; she squeezed her daughter’s hand and shook her head. “Let _him_ go after this man.”

Persephone shook her head.

“I can’t let him go alone.” Persephone looked down at the girl, and Demeter saw why: because it wouldn’t be fair, would it, to leave that little girl without a father, if it all turned bad? Because she was the heir. Because she would be – the world fell into place.

Demeter’s hands tightened.

“You want me to take her,” Demeter said, voice thick with emotion. “Because if you don’t come back – “

“Yes. Little Meli will be _basilinna_ of the Underworld. The only heir, you see.” Her daughter’s voice almost shook, and Demeter did not smile, too thrown by this to be able to bring any comfort. “There’s – documents, down there. In his office. If we don’t return, you’re her guardian and regent until such point she is able to…” 

“Your husband agree to this?” Demeter barked a short laugh, ugly as she thought of how Hades face must have looked at this request; there was little love left between them. Persephone bit her lip in response.

“He knows there is no one else I’d trust to raise her if…” She looked down at the tiny child in the bed below them, snoring logs. “He said, _I suppose she has already raised one queen of the underworld, and I cannot fault her for how she raised you. She will defend our daughter, and fight for her wishes. And she could never be dissuaded from doing so, no matter what the difficulty. She is as ideal a candidate as we have._”

It was praise, or as close as her brother came to having it for her. Demeter felt a bit warmer at the thought, and realized a part of her was still waiting for him to walk back into her life, even if he had no right to, after what he’d done.

“Please.” Persephone’s hand clasped her own, her grasp growing tighter and tighter until Demeter thought if she was a mortal woman, her daughter’s clenched belief would snap it whole. “There is no one else I trust, with her. I – “her voice cracked, and with it, Demeter’s heart. “I love you, mom.”

“Of course.” She scoffed, leaned over and fingered one long, tightly wound curl of her granddaughter’s head. Three generations, and only the little one had any sense to her whatsoever. “And I love you too, always. I’m sorry if you didn’t know that.” Her throat tightened, and she ignored that ungodly lump, even as it burned in her throat. She wasn’t her dour brother; Demeter was going to say what she damn well had to say. “I always did and I always will. True I would never have chosen that man but…I can’t blame you for making the best of it. And I can’t –” She dabbed furiously at the corner of her eyes, refusing to cry. “Why don’t you let me go with? If death can’t bind him, life –“

“Someone has to raise her.” Her daughter sighed. “If we fall victim to his machinations, father will light up all of Corinth with his lightning.”

“That’s all your fool of a father is good for,” Demeter muttered. She knew her daughter was right; her father understood – and was good at – shows of strength, but he’d be a rotten guardian, and Rhea and Cronus, well…Demeter knew Hades would never allow that. It was what had lead Demeter and countless other women into thinking the man had a sense of wisdom, at one point. He’d raze this guest to the ground but he wouldn’t intercede unless Hades tried to handle his own house first. Ruthless calculus, she thought; ruthless. She hated it. But she knew, too, that her daughter was right.

There was a familiar and hated clip-clop of a pair of powerful hooves outside and she did not have to ask to realize just who it was coming to join him.

“It’s time.” Persephone smiled, strong, and stood up, brushing down her dress. “I have to go.”

She leaned over her daughter’s little sleeping form, pressed a kiss to her brow that the child only squirmed lightly in response to. “Be good for mama, baby. I love you. Daddy loves you, too. Please…please remember that.” Her voice broke, and Demeter’s heart with it.

She flickered her eyes toward the girl, still sleeping, then toward the window, and knew what she had to offer. “Your husband can come in, if he wants. Say his…” The word _goodbye_ lodged into her throat and she couldn’t speak it. “Say his piece.”

She looked up sharply at her mother, surprise written in her raised brows. “You’d let him?”

“For her sake.” She avoided the question of whether he was welcome; he wasn’t, not really. Gratitude flashed on her daughter’s face, and she hurried out of the room with a quickly murmured _thank you_, lest Demeter change her mind. Demeter folded her arms and stared at her little charge, who snuggled deeper into her mother’s little cot, her fuzzy little head full of nothing but peaceful dreams. Demeter bit back the bile that rose in her as her brother swept into the room, his fuzzy hair a mess as damn usual.

He nodded once at her, a swallow in that big old throat. He opened his mouth to speak and she shook her head. “Time’s short. Talk to her.”

He nodded, and a sort of ceasefire wordlessly was laid down between them. He bent low and nudged his little daughter, waking her.

“Salutations,” he murmured, and the little one stirred before Demeter could tell him that no kid was gonna respond to _salutations_.

“Daddy!” She curled her hands around her father’s wide head and he picked her up, arms clinging tightly to the little girl as he stood holding her a long moment. Demeter was surprised he’d let the child call him something as undignified as _daddy_, but perhaps that was Persephone’s doing. Wasn’t like she’d had a lot of choices in what to call her own father, who had mostly ignored her existence.

“Ah, how I missed you,” he said softly. He kissed the girl’s little cheek. “My _daughter_.”

She’d give him this: he did love that little girl. It was obvious in the break of his voice, in the way he was holding her, in the expression on that old stone-face. He was breathing her scent deep, and she knew he was trying to memorize his daughter in every way. She knew because she had done the same, once, as her daughter had walked away with him.

“Go home now?” The little one tugged at his beard and Demeter excused herself, not wanting to hear his reply.

“Thank you,” Persephone said. “You’ve done him a great favor. I didn’t think you’d—”

“I always regretted you never really had a father,” she said, brutally honest, for what was left to them but honesty? “Seems to me if he’s interested in staying around, then…” She shrugged.

“Thank you.” Persephone curled her arms around her mother’s shoulders and squeezed her tight, so tight. “I’m so sorry I underestimated…” She trailed off, and Demeter did not say it was alright, because it was not, but Demeter just nodded and curled her tight around her daughter.

“You come back,” she muttered. “You get your _guest_ and you drag him down to Tartarus and you come right on back.”

“I will,” she said, smiling against her, and Demeter could not see it, but knew it from the shape of her lips against Demeter’s cheek. She kissed her mother’s cheek and Demeter clung tighter to her for a long moment.

And then as he so often did, Hades appeared, ruining a good moment by murmuring “be good,” to his little girl and awkwardly moving the girl into Demeter’s arms.

He touched his wife’s shoulder, and even Demeter knew they had to go.

“You come back,” she said to her brother. “You come right on back, too, brother. This little girl, she’s gonna be missin’ ya both.”

The girl in her arms whimpered; she didn’t know what Hades had told her, and now it felt like it was too late to ask. “Come on baby, you gonna stay with grandma a little bit,” Persephone murmured, running her hand through the girl’s curls. “Mommy and daddy will be back soon. Remember, we love you.”

“Yes,” he said, quiet as he so often was. “Yes.”

Surprisingly, the little girl settled her heavy head on Demeter’s shoulder with little fuss. She watched, silently, with her grandmother, as her parents took to their chariot and went out into the night.

She kissed the girl’s cheek and marveled at how she didn’t even so much as sniffle, watching her parents take off into the night. “Come with me, Meli, you’re gonna stay with grammie for a bit.” Demeter hastily tried to remember stories she hadn’t told since Persephone was a child, and filled the night air with them, trying to distract her granddaughter before she could voice the inevitable questions as to her parent’s return. To her surprise, the girl just looked up at her, with flinty eyes that reminded Demeter of nothing so much as her brother long ago, back in the days when he had been her baby doll.

And for the first time in a long time, she did not wince in thinking of him in those times, and when the girl fell asleep on her lap, snoring lightly into her shoulder, Demeter just clutched the child closer, and felt her eyes drift shut.

* * *

She was momentarily confused when she woke up, small hands pushing into her with such urgency she feared for the worst, and she woke stiff and confused.

“Grammie!” the little thing whimpered. “Grammie up!”

“Hm?” She murmured, sleepy still; the girl whimpered, shoving harder. “Light! Up!”

She squinted up in the light; it was a bright morning, and she wondered if it had woken the girl. She brightened at that thought; perhaps there was something of her mother’s people in her after all, if she liked the early morning light.

“Good girl,” Demeter murmured; she thought for a moment about Hades and Persephone. Corinth was far; Demeter knew that was at least a solid several hour drive in one of her chariots. Hades' chariot was faster than any mortal one – Persephone and her mother had learned that much.

And Hades, of course, was a fast driver. For the first time in a very long time, she prayed it would serve him well.

She flipped the curtain to her room closed; she could not help them but she could protect their daughter, and surely part of that was keeping her from view. No knowing how far this clever king’s contacts went. She’d keep Meli confined to the great gardens of the backyard, where one would have to go through Demeter’s forest grove to find them; her home temple would just have to go deserted today. Plenty to do outside there; had the little thing ever even seen clouds in the sky? She doubted it.

The girl was pliant and sweet; she didn’t protest when Demeter didn’t bother to open the curtains in the kitchen either. Supposed the girl was bound to be used to low light even if she had seemed to like the bright skies; if she liked the heat of the sun on her skin, she’d get plenty in the backyard.

“Meli,” she hummed, singing old children’s songs with the girl's name put in. She prepared a simple breakfast, just some porridge with a bit of sweet bread at the side, and the girl ate it without any complaint and with a large amount of mess, porridge getting almost everywhere and breadcrumbs close behind. She said little, concentrating on the meal, and Demeter was glad for the silence.

“Mommy and daddy soon?” She asked toward the end, and Demeter used every bit of her strength to keep her face neutral as she dabbed her sleeve over the girl’s dirty face.

“Soon,” she murmured; she didn’t want to give the girl a more defined time, knowing that if she did, the girl would be counting down the hours. “Soon as they can.”

She whined a bit at that; Demeter grabbed her little hand and took her down from the table quickly, distracting her by cleaning her, though that, too, put her in a bad mood.

“Want daddy,” the little thing grumbled. Demeter bit back the urge to scoff; it was hard to believe that even this one, even this one so much blood of his blood, his heir, could want to spend time with him. But then, she thought, the girl had known no other father.

And she would perhaps – grudgingly said, and not to his face, but perhaps – admit that he was good to this girl, good to this girl when he had nobody to teach him to be a father any more than she had anyone to teach her to be a mother. That was the problem in their whole generation: so much blood and so much war and so, so little love.

She wondered, feeling a cold dread sink through her blood: What if they didn’t come back? Not only would it be awful for all the obvious reasons, but what did Demeter know about raising a queen of the dead? How could she even hope to prepare this girl for the role she would play?

“Want daddy!”She said again, stomping her little foot. Demeter felt a temper tantrum coming on, sure as a storm rolling in. The girl opened her mouth but shut it as Demeter tapped her nose.

“Meli,” she said. “What do you and daddy usually do after breakfast?”

Meli grinned, big as the moon; she was happy to talk about him, Demeter noted. Blessed was the child, ignorant of their own history. 

“Daddy and me walk,” she said. That made sense; the Underworld was a vast place. When the girl became Queen, she would need to know it well, know every inch of dreadful darkness from the Phlegethon to the Styx. “Momma too!”

“That so?” She brushed the little thing’s wild hair – the child’s hair in its wide ball reminded her of nothing so much as a little dandelion. There were still a few of them outside; she smiled. Meli would enjoy blowing them, she thought; her mother always had. “I like to go for walks, too.”

She grabbed the little one’s shoulder and slowly directed her towards the door to the backyard. It was not be as spectacular as it was in the summer – it was fall now, and almost everything had gone brown, but with the child’s background, even this would seem novel. 

“Come on, Meli,” she said. “Let’s go for a walk. Like with your mom and dad.”

Meli looked up at her, a small frown furrowing her face, and this was so much like her father that for half a moment, Demeter was half-convinced she was back in the belly of the beast, carrying her little brother who cried into her shoulder every night.

“It’s just like the underground,” said Demeter; she had only been to the underworld once – when Persephone was first born, when Zeus insisted they hear her fate from great Gaea – but she remembered it, remembered Hades' fields. Wintertime here looked not-unlike all seasons there; an autumn day would be close but just a bit more verdant than what she was used to. 

She opened the door and gently tugged the girl forward – having seen her run off, Demeter wasn’t going to take the chance she would do so again. The girl looked up at the sky and stopped dead in her tracks, then immediately looked down toward the ground. Her gaze stayed there. This Demeter understood all too well: she remembered what it felt like, coming from such intense confinement to a world open on all sides. Meli never had it so bad – in that respect Demeter was thankful Hades did not take after their father – but Demeter knew that the sky was an overwhelming place.

“It’s alright,” she murmurred. “The sky will not harm you. It is your great-grandfather, Meli. He watches over you, as he watches over us all.” She did not tell the child of her family’s long and bloody history. That was a tale for another day, long from now. Ignorance, Demeter thought, was far more blissful.

Her granddaughter made a little squeak in response; her chin wobbled. She tried to turn around; Demeter understood. She sat down, planting Meli on her lap. She strained to free herself, trying to spill over the sides of Demeter’s lap.

“It’s okay, little one,” she says, brushing down the girl’s dandelion hair slowly and rubbing her scalp. “You’re okay. Look down at the ground.” She tapped a little red fruit on the ground; a pomegranate. “See? This is a pomegranate. This one’s a bit old, but they’re quite tasty things. Your momma –” She cleared her throat. “Your momma really loves these. Want me to find you a nice, fresh one? We can cut it up together…”

“Wanna go home!” Meli cried out, tears coming in now with a squeal loud enough to wake the dead, if she were in her homeland. “Hurts! Wanna go home!”

“Meli,” she whisperred. “Can’t do that, not yet.” Her parents wouldn’t want her to see what they’re doing to their latest _guest_, of that she was sure. “I know your heart hurts, but…you’ll go home soon.”

Meli screamed something that she didn’t understand; a word not in any language but her own, a wild screech. She raised her arms up with trembling strength and Demeter’s jaw dropped as the earth rose up under them; she scrambled backwards, trying to cling to the girl, but Meli broke away. She moved with surprising speed and strength as she tumbled down toward the opening hole in the earth, which was moving, the dirt shifting upwards, becoming a cave.

The girl ran toward it and Demeter tried to follow, but her legs refused to move, her shock too great.

“Home!” the girl cried. “Go home!”

“Meli!” She ran fast, but the child somehow ran faster, despite the unfamiliar terrain; Demeter’s legs finally began to move, and she followed her into the cave quickly. In the dark, Meli could see better, but Demeter was stubborn enough to make up for the blindness.

“Stop!” Demeter yelled, but the girl barreled deeper into the cave; Demeter followed, still blind, if less so. She was starting to adjust, but girl was nowhere to be seen.

“Oh,” she said, soft; she took a deep breath and tried to imagine where the girl would go. Should she keep running, and fear the girl fall into the depths ahead of her? “Meli, please come to grandma. Please.”

She stumbled forward several steps, and then suddenly, miraculously, there was a hand, tugging on her leg.

“Grammie,” a voice said, soft, and she all but fell onto the child in relief, gathering her in her arms.

“Granddaughter,” she breathed softly; the child’s sweet milk scent came in loud and strong. Not hurt, not hurt, safe and sound. “Meli, you scared me.”

The child looked oddly at her. She pressed her hands over her grandmother’s eyes. “Go home, okay?” She tugged Demeter’s chin. “Take grammie home.”

“Can’t go home yet,” she murmured. “Not yet. You gotta stay with grammie.”

The girl said nothing in response, curling up in her grandmother’s arms as she picked her up and held her tight to her chest.

“I know we ain’t been able to be right close just yet.” She brushed the girl’s cheek with her own, rubbing small circles in her too-tiny back. “But it’s gonna be okay. It’s gonna be okay. Your momma and daddy will take you home soon.” She tried to smile at that thought, though it felt strange. “How about this: this time, you walk outside with Grammie, and when your mommy and daddy take you home, you can show grammie all your favorite places down there, hm?”

The girl wiggled off her lap and frowned. “Hurts, grammie.”

“Hurts?” She frowned as she watched the girl try to point upwards, toward the lip of the cave.

"Hurts," she said again.

“Oh,” she said, and suddenly, she understood. The girl hadn’t been in light nearly any of her life: the darkness of the underground, going to Olympus at night, the blanket over her crib – her daughter’s daughter had adjusted too well to her home.

“Oh, baby,” she said. “I’m sorry.” And truly she was; this was a worse thing, a pitiable circumstance. The girl’s adjustment to the light below meant she’d never walk with her mother’s family, never be one to feel the joy of growing life in her hands, never be one to have anything to her but the darkness and the dead deep below. Demeter’s heart felt overwhelmed by pity for this little blind-child.

She’d have to be like her father in the end; grabbing a spouse up from the mud, whenever one appeared. Doomed to a lonely existence, eeking out a living with the weighing of the dead souls, never to know the pleasures of life.

Hades, at least, had been older, when he had been sent to the mire.

The girl ferreted around in the dark. “Don’t go far,” Demeter said, useless, and the girl shook her head.

“Grammie sad.” She puttered about Demeter in clumsy circles; she watched her move as best she could. The girl clearly had an easier time walking the cave than her grandmother; she could only see her in brief flickers of shadows. She didn’t go far. “Make better,” she said, and Demeter shook her head.

“You can’t, baby, just come here.” She’d wait with the girl in the cave until Apollo was not quite so directly overhead of them; when he passed, so too would they. She would find a way to retrofit the house to try to help the girl adjust to the light gradually – perhaps that could help her train her eyes. She was young. It was not too late to adjust, and she’d have a word with Persephone, who surely would let the girl come up if – if it meant she, too, wasn’t trapped horribly down below, at least not any more than her mother was.

But then she thought, as she watched the girl squat in the dirt: the girl _wanted_ to be in the dirt, had the same instinctual call to earth that her mother had had, and her mother’s mother, and her mother’s mother’s mother and perhaps even great Gaia herself. But unlike all the women of her line, she did not grow things in the dirt – she simply carved paths in it.

Like her father.

As in so many other things.

Demeter felt something hot and wet on her cheek and realized she was crying; she jabbed at it angrily, needing to clear her eyes, needing to keep an eye on the child she could just barely see in her darkness.

“Meli?”

A little hand brushed her own hand and she startled as Meli trundled up to her, something in her hands. No – a _lot_ in her hands, so much so that she’d pulled her skirts up to hold it, which was quite clever for a toddler. “For Grammie!” she said, and flicked her skirts, and a pile of – something – flew toward her. Demeter picked up one of the things; it was soft, smooth, and when she brought it closer, she realized what it was.

“You…” She sucked in her breath as the little girl hugged at her knees.

“Mushbooms!” The little one waved one toward her; brown and unassuming, but tasty. Hades’ favorite, when they were children. “Daddy like. Mommy like. Me like. Grammie like?”

“Yes,” she breathed, stunned. “Yes. Did you…?” She frowned. Meli had seemingly made this cave; she couldn’t imagine that as a toddler, the girl’s powers were so advanced that she could produce her own fungi to support it. Just how far did her powers already go? She grinned, oblivious, toward Demeter, her mother’s zealous little grin breaking her damn heart.

"Mushrooms make better, grammie.” She grinned with a wide smile, one Demeter could see some of, her teeth glinting in the dark.

“You grew these?” She asked; the girl looked at her with her head tilted.

“How do you find these, Meli? Show me?” That she understood better and she gathered Meli’s little mushrooms in her hands as she walked behind the girl, closely following her footsteps. She watched as the girl stopped, and gathered her hands together in some dirt. There was no seed that Demeter could see, but when she crouched down and covered the girl’s hand she felt the unmistakable pull of the earth, the warmth of the land.

“Mushboom!” The girl cried out, and it was so: sprouting from nothing, the girl simply wished for the dark plant to grow, and it did.

She had something of her mother’s side, after all.

Demeter carefully swept the girl into her arms, ignoring the mushrooms that clattered at her feet. They could make more! “Oh, my girl.” She breathed in her baby scent deeply and kissed her forehead. “My little girl.”

They spent a few hours on that game: Meli growing, and Demeter helping her gather up her crops, heart nearly bursting in pride. She wondered: did Persephone know? Hades? She would have to mention it when they got back.

“Let’s have some of these for supper,” she said, soft; the sun was falling now, and the girl was blessedly occupied by trying to carry back as many mushrooms as she could, and in doing so did not ask many questions.

She watched her move carefully, her father’s serious nature and her mother’s delicate touch combined in each of Meli’s tiny steps. For the first time, Demeter thought perhaps that combination had promise.

The girl shot her a grin as if she knew what her grandmother was thinking. Demeter was all too happy to have it.

She put the girl down for a nap with a minimum amount of fuss – using her powers had left her unsurprisingly drained. Still, Demeter kept an eye on her as she prepared supper, a soup made of the mushrooms Meli had created; her eyes darted to the girl often on the little settee she’d nestled into. She wondered if it would rupture the new-found peace if she asked if perhaps the girl could stay, just once in a while. Would she come for the summer this year? 

It would be a shame for her talents to molder underground year-round, after all.

But then she thought to her brother’s face as the girl had screeched _daddy!_ and thought: no, no I cannot ask that, to deprive him of her company. Was already taking the mother half the year. But maybe in winter she could – well, it would be worth it to suffer _him_, to see the girl, right?

Her thoughts on the subject occupied her so long, she did not hear the clopping of horse’s hooves outside the doorway, nor did she hear her brother’s approach. As always, death came softly. He put a hand on her shoulder and gently pressed down and she all but screeched, turned around whip smart with the ladle for the mushroom soup still within her hands.

“Peace, sister, I…” he backed away a whole step and she saw the flicker of something that almost looked like hope in those big old eyes vanish. His wide, full mouth quivered.

“You big idiot,” she muttered, the words hot, and she caught him in a strong hug, all but sagged against him, relieved he had come back alive. “Moron. I taught you better than to sneak up on a – a woman!” She swallowed, immediately thinking of how he had he snuck up on my daughter. That, she had still not quite forgiven.

“I know.” He pulled her head under his beard, as fuzzy as the rest of his hair. At least Meli hopefully wouldn’t inherit _that_. He pressed his mouth to the top of her head; not quite a kiss but a barrier crossed between them regardless.

Demeter let that go ignored; she might have challenged him on that statement in the past, but now she only stared past him at the door, looking for her daughter to come in. “Where is…?”

“Just giving the horses some water. We’ve ridden them hard.”

“Why is she…?” She frowned; Demeter did not know how her daughter and her husband had divided their marital duties, but she knew how Hades had always doted upon those damn horses and did not think any mother would hesitate to see a babe as sweet as Meli.

“I wanted a moment of your time.” His voice was quiet and she tensed; she pulled away and he sighed.

“I mean only to thank you for letting me back into your home.” He held his hands up and she scoffed. “Do you trust me so little still? I had thought perhaps by your kindness with Melinoe that you had forgiven…”

“I still think you're a damn moron_. _You took from me, and my girl too, and I can’t forget that.” She saw his face start to fall and looked away back into the boiling soup, the musky earth scent comforting her.

“I see,” he said, voice thin and reedy. “I won’t trouble you then, beyond–”

“Hades.” She sighed and blew out the fire, not wanting to overdo it. “You also gave me that girl over there. And maybe you haven’t been that bad as a husband for my girl, even if she didn’t have much of a say in it. That’s …not nothing. It’s a start. Maybe it can…can be a new start.”

“I…see.” He shifted behind her, and she wasn’t surprised that by the time she’d gotten two bowls from her cubboard in her hands that he’d moved over to the girl, was standing above her. “Was she well-behaved?”

“For the most part.” Her one melt-down wasn’t, truly, her fault so much as Demeter’s own ignorance, and she would own that as her mistake. “She’s a special girl, she is.”

He smiled softly, pulled a bit on his beard. “She is, it is true. I have been blessed by the fates, to have her as my daughter.”

She pulled out a fourth bowl, smaller than the others, and slowly spooned in a small amount of soup, blowing on it to cool it down.

The door opened and she heard a second entrance; when she glanced back, she felt a lump in her throat: her daughter had come in, and was now arm-in-arm with her husband, staring at the girl.

“She has been good,” he murmured.

“You and momma okay?” she said, in a low murmur that Demeter was sure she wasn’t meant to overhear. He shook his head very slowly, then murmured that they were trying, and that Demeter thought was truthful enough she didn’t bother to correct him. She busied herself setting the table, putting Meli and Persephone’s bowl down toward them. 

She put two more bowls of mushroom soup on the table as Hades bent down to collect the girl; Persephone turned back to her, arms open, and Demeter fell into them. “Your guest in his quarters?”

“Quite well locked in them,” she whispered. “And Thanatos is alright, if a bit fragrant.” Her smile faltered for a moment, brows going up in puzzlement as she looked at the table, and counted the bowls.

“Mom…?”

She nodded and Seph smiled, mouthed _thank you_ wordlessly and squeezed her hand. Demeter felt a blast of springtime warmth run through her and smiled. Demeter had not realized she had kept winter in her heart, but she had, and she felt it melting out, despite the chill of the world outside. Hades had his attention wholly on his child, and the girl shrieked with an all-consuming joy and flung herself at her father as soon as she was awake. Hades struggled to hold onto her, and the girl slipped free of him quickly, throwing herself to her mother.

“Momma!” Persephone held her up and kissed her cheek, coing over how good she had been. She turned back to face her mother, obvious pride on her face, and Meli squirmed, looking toward her.

Melli held out her arms to her grandmother, “Grammie!” She said, and then the girl was passed once more, and Demeter’s heartbeat sped up as the child nested in her arms, all smiles.

“Hello, little one.” She hugged her tight. Hades scrapped one of her big wooden chairs back, and Persephone was quick to join him. She nudged Melinoe’s little bowl toward Demeter and winked, and Demeter understood what she was really giving her, and she swallowed and nodded.

“Want to eat with Grammie, Melinoe?”

“Mushbooms!” She cried out, and Demeter helped the girl clumsily eat her soup – and made a huge mess, as a child was wont to do.

But – that was alright.

After all, they could clean up all kinds of messes.

The night went fast – and though they talked until dawn, Demeter barely noticed the time go by.

When the girl and her parents went off, back to their deep underground home through the cave Melinoe had created, Demeter waved goodbye with a different sort of sadness than she had in years past, when only Persephone had left her.

“I could repair the cave,” Hades murmured in her ear as he shook her hand goodbye.

“Keep it.” She shrugged, though it felt difficult to do so. “Keep it and – use it. Whenever you or she want to. Shoulda had a connection made for you all here, years ago.”

His eyes widened slightly, but he nodded. He did not say thank you, for they were not quite on those terms yet, but she felt hopeful. If he behaved himself, anyway.

As the rest of her family went down to the world below, Demeter watched. The girl waved toward her, and Demeter waved back, and hoped they would meet again soon.


End file.
